Case Number 02392: Small Claims Court

BLOOD FREAK

The Charge

Only the blood of drug addicts can satisfy its thirst!

The Case

While cruising the sun stroked byways of Retirement Territory, U.S.A (AKA
Florida) on his mega-machined chopper, wounded Vietnam veteran Herschel runs
into Jesus' personal P.R. representative, Angel. She lives with her dope fiend
sister Ann in a house frequented by several prime examples of why American
ingenuity and productivity was so poor in the '70s. While Angel preaches the
psalms to Herschel, Ann tries to get to "know" him in the true
Biblical sense. Realizing that the only begetting old Hersch is interested in is
of the platonic variety, Ann seeks her revenge by making the beefy buffoon smoke
some oregano doobies laced with pure smack. One puff, and Herschel is hooked,
painfully craving (like a pre-pork rind pig out Anna Nicole) more spiked smoke
to calm his horrible overacting. But instead he gets a job on a local turkey
farm where the inbred cousins of Bartles and James feed him a free bird pumped
full of Adolph's meat tenderizer, overly salty chicken broth, and the magic
ingredient Polyplotpoint 80. Instead of copping a buzz off the L-tryptophan,
however, Herschel turns into a half-man/half bird beast, complete with
papier-mâché turkey head and overdubbed gobble. Hungry like the hen,
he goes out looking for drug addicts to kill for their rich, chemically enhanced
blood. And while Ann feels guilt for getting Herschel hooked, and Angel
memorizes the last few Beatitudes, the foul feathered fiend roams the streets of
Sun City Center, looking for supermodels, rock stars and grade schoolers to
supply him with the opium rich artery juice he so desperately needs.

What do you get when you cross some retread reefer madness, accidental drug
addiction, religious fundamentalism, body building and processed turkey loaf?
Well, if you're oddball director Brad Grinter, you end up with Blood
Freak, the only film in the entire exploitation canon to be endorsed by The
Southern Baptist Convention, the Betty Ford Clinic, and the Butterball
Thanksgiving Hotline. There is probably no other movie in the long lineage of
monster/maniac/heroin related filmography that centers on a brawny European
muscleman getting addicted to Chinese rock enhanced wacky weed while working as
the subject of some warped experiments at the local subsidiary of the Perdue
poultry empire. Only Godmonster of Indian Flats can boast a more bizarre
cinematic universe, and yet its Old West weirdness just cannot compare to
Freak's Vietnam vet in a fowl mood madness. It's hard to fathom what
Grinter was hoping to achieve with this movie. Was he mad at drugs? Irritated by
religion? Longing for the invention of Stovetop Stuffing? The motivation is
unclear. But the method used to achieve it is downright demented. Grinter is of
the old cinematic school that feels a movie doesn't have to make a great deal of
linear sense as long as it contains frequent shots of the director smoking.
That's right, about every eight minutes or so, our swarthy South Florida
celluloid sod appears on camera, eyes blurry from too many Tom Collins, fingers
and breath stained yellow from endless Marlboros, hair swirled with a
combination of Alberto VO5 and dried vomit, and proceeds to narrate the film by
blatantly reading from the script. His Grecian Formula 16 chorus adds an
inebriated pseudo-philosophy to the entire pissed off psycho pullet
shenanigans.

But these drunken monotonous-logues by Mr. Grinter, with their non-sensical
segues and his pre-throat cancerous croak are not the only unhinged things about
Blood Freak. The whole religious, Jesus saves subplot is hilariously out
of place here. It's as if some cast member ran across a copy of The
Watchtower on the craft services table and wouldn't let the production
finish until there was a little holy hollering added to the sex, drugs, and
turkey murders. The cast gives off the aura of being perplexed by their own
performances, with the forced child confession emoting of the actress playing
Ann as plastic as the elaborate layers of eye paint she wears -- Tammy Faye must
be spinning in her vanity chair. But it's the whole murderous doped up
turkey-man idea that shoots this movie into the surreal stratosphere. The scenes
of our strung out strongman, big bullem bird head in place, attacking victims
and letting blood have an unworldly, downright disturbing quality. You will be
laughing, mind you, but some of the gore is fairly nasty. Especially effective
is an elongated torture scene near the end of the film. Lets just say it
involves our insane roaster, a table saw, and a drug dealer's leg (Lucio Fulci
would be proud, if he wasn't already preparing to rip it off). The kinetic,
freestyle editing, the endless shots of Grinter babbling like an improvising,
smut peddling Criswell, and actors who play dead by wincing and wiggling as all
the while effects gore dribbles across their face makes Blood Freak a
first rate crazed capon caper.

Something Weird Video truly lives up to its title in the DVD extra inclusion
department. Bouncing off the different themes present in the movie, we are
treated to short subjects which essay a wide, weird variety of topics: star
Steve Hawkes' bad writing, blackmail, drug use, God, LSD, religion, nudist
camps, and the pain and horror of being the only family on the block unable to
have roasted Tom Turk on Thanksgiving. They even throw in trailers and another
round of vintage horror comic covers to intensify the binge bloat. And with such
a diverse mix of media, the image presentation is equally uneven. Blood
Freak is offered in full screen only and looks like it was ridden hard and
left for scrap. Part of this is due to the $1.25 budget, but it also has to do
with its status as a lost "classic," which means the only print they
could find was rotting away in some relative's septic tank. Still, it looks
pretty good for a long forgotten piece of film. Most of the shorts offered have
grain and scratches, but considering their age and scarcity, this is not
uncommon. And not bothersome. With over three hours of content, this is one
fully dressed and stuffed to the gullet disc. So the next time you invite your
family over to freeload and feedbag on a little pilgrim repast and want to find
a way to vacate the premises before having to choke down another piece of Aunt
Lorraine's hideous squash and quince pie, just break out your DVD of Blood
Freak and press play. If this 80-minute disasterpiece doesn't have them
praising God for the recreational vehicle and high tailing it back to Branson,
nothing will. This is the true wild turkey!